


Smack the Box

by stardustandswimmingpools



Category: Doctor Who (2005), Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: British Character, Fluff and Humor, Gen, be warned, descriptions of the TARDIS noise, fun for the whole family, i say that because they are both brits (or sorts) and i am not, like that summer, made up the loreins bc artistic license, malfunctioning spaceships, meet-crash, ron is in love with hermione a lil bit, ron realizing his worth, set between Chamber of Secrets and Prisoner of Azkaban, unrealistic plot devices
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-17
Updated: 2017-11-17
Packaged: 2019-02-03 12:06:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12747990
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stardustandswimmingpools/pseuds/stardustandswimmingpools
Summary: A big blue box crash-lands in Ron's backyard, which is the last thing he needs right now.





	Smack the Box

**Author's Note:**

> i was reading a ton of doctor who/harry potter crossover fics, and i saw a bunch with the doctor meeting harry, or hermione, or luna...and none with ron. and i thought, "why not???" ron is a perfectly honest character. and he's severely underrated. and because i'm a fanfiction writer, and i can do things like this, i wrote the fic i wanted to read. and i hope y'all wanna read it too. i also feel like the Doctor could definitely assert some of Ron's shaky confidence. poor dude always gets stuff secondhand, secondhand wand, secondhand praise, blah blah blah. anyway, read it! and leave a comment if you like it. thanks!

“Take a walk,” Ron mutters. “What sort of rubbish advice is that? 'Trouble with your homework, Ronald? Take a walk.’ Take a bloody walk! What, 'm I gonna find the answers in my bloody backyard?”

He kicks a rock in impassioned irritation. It goes flying across the field. At last, frustrated and genuinely at wit’s end, he collapses onto his back on the grass. Above him, the sky gazes down, a cordial shade of blue offset by puffy clouds swallowing sections of the endless blue. He tries to find shapes in the clouds, but draws a blank. 

Hermione would find some, he thinks morosely. Hundreds. She's always had an eye for that sort of thing. She could help Ron with his homework.

Unfortunately, Hermione’s not here. And Harry probably hasn't got any more start than Ron has. Frankly, Ron thinks, cringing slightly, he can't imagine Harry’s enjoying himself at all. Blasted Dursleys. He shouldn't have tried to ring him, truthfully, not without proper understanding of that — that fellyphone thing. He presumes that writing Harry by owl will have the worst effect on his anti-wizardry family, unfortunately. 

Lost in thought, he doesn't really feel the wind picking up. It's only when a wheezing sound, like someone hyperventilating through a megaphone, grows loud and insistent, that Ron blinks and shoots to his feet. In an instant his wand is out, and he whirls around, trying to locate the source of that increasingly overpowering sound. 

“Who's there?” he shouts, using his free hand to attempt to smooth down his hair. Suddenly it's visible: a big, deep blue... _ box _ sort of thing, vanishing and then solidifying into existence just in front of Ron’s face. Ron flinches backwards, squinting at the box until it seems to finalize its shape and the wheezing noise comes to an abrupt stop. Ron blinks repeatedly, but the box stays.

“Merlin’s pants,” he mutters. “Can't have a single normal day in my bloody life, can I?” He raises his voice. “Oi! Who's in there?”

Tentatively, he steps closer to the box. It says  _ Police Public Call Box _ , with a siren on the top, and there are two windows, but he can't see anything through them. Once again, Ron finds himself wishing Hermione were here. She’d know what in Merlin’s name a police public call box is, and she'd know what to do. Or even just to have his mum. Molly Weasley has always had the answers.

Unfortunately, Ron’s quite alone in this. 

He's about to — he's not quite sure, maybe prod it or something — when the door is thrown open and out spills a torrent of smoke and steam. Ron coughs, stumbling back, as a man essentially trips out of the box. He's got a brown, sort of staid trench coat on, over a pinstripe suit, and disheveled hair that could rival Harry’s. He's coughing, too.

“Back!” The man says, urgency in his voice as he turns on his heel and slams the door of the box shut. He pulls out a device and presses it to the place where the lock would normally be, then — he must press some kind of button, because the tip of the device lights up blue and buzzes. Finally, the man stops, sighs in evident relief, and falls backwards against the box. “Stabilized her for the moment. That was close. Whew! What a rush. Right, then. Where am I?”

Ron snaps out of his stunned state and raises his wand. “Who are you?” he demands.

He hopes his voice is threatening enough.

The man doesn't look particularly nervous. He stares with curiosity at Ron’s wand, then at Ron. “I’m the Doctor,” he says, somehow grinning cheerily. “What’re you pointing at me? What's that? A stick?”

“A wand!” Ron exclaims, realizing a moment too late that maybe this isn't the correct thing to tell someone who, despite his strange appearance in their yard, is, for all intents and purposes, a Muggle. He hurriedly covers up his blunder. “Doctor what? What are you doing in my backyard? How did you get here?”

“I'll answer your questions in reverse order, how about that?” The Doctor smiles. He seems entirely unperturbed by this interrogation. “My ship sort of — malfunctioned. Doesn't happen a lot, she just needs a good smack and she'll be off again. I'm in your backyard by mistake, I've crashed here, it wasn't on purpose, I guarantee. Although,” he adds, like an afterthought, “this is a nice place, isn't it?”

“Doctor  _ what?  _ ” Ron presses. 

The so-called Doctor’s smile is infuriatingly good-natured. “Just the Doctor. And now, if you don't mind my asking — when am I? And where?”

Ron frowns, draws his eyebrows together. What kind of Muggle is this? “This is Ottery St. Catchpole,” he says carefully. “How’d you mean, when?”

“The year,” the Doctor prompts, like it's the most common thing to be asking the year.

“1993,” Ron says. “Are you drunk?”

The Doctor’s eyebrows shoot up into his hair. He looks affronted. “What? No! Why’d you ask that?”

“How else would you forget the year?” Ron challenges.

“Oh! Well.” The Doctor screws up his face like there's an itch he can't quite scratch. “My ship travels in time. Happens quite a lot, actually. Hard to keep track of the years.”

Ron rolls his eyes. “Right, you're raving mad, then.” He tightens his hold on his wand.

“Quite right,” the Doctor says. “Sensible man. Only a madman would crash-land in Ottery St. Catchpole. Still — I am stuck here. And I could use your help, if you don't mind. My ship’s not quite working, and I swear I'll get out of your ginger hair as soon as possible, but I need to fix my ship. Shouldn't take long at all. I've got someplace to be, actually, so the sooner I can leave the better. Well, a couple of places. Well. A couple of places and a couple of  _ times.  _ And a tunnel.” He flips the device in his hand, almost unconsciously.

“Blimey,” Ron says, aghast. “What's that thing?”

He points to the stick in the Doctor’s hand — metal, buzzing, glowing blue. Some sort of wand, maybe — but it couldn't be, there's no such thing as a wand made of metal, a wand that runs on electricity. Electricity is a Muggle concept, and besides, it doesn't work in the presence of magic. Hermione’s words.

The Doctor looks at the stick in his hand. “Screwdriver,” he answers. Ron waits for the punchline, but instead the Doctor adds, “Sonic one, that is. Not a typical screwdriver, I'd say.”

“My dad, he likes that stuff,” Ron says. It's slowly becoming clear that, though possibly bonkers, the Doctor isn't a threat. “Muggle tools and screwdrivers and...all sorts. But how come you've ended up in our backyard, what with being a Muggle?”

“A what?”

“Muggle,” Ron repeats, feeling somehow as if he's talking to a wall. “Someone who — well — a non-magical person, you know.” He looks at his feet. 

“Non-magical?” The surprise in the Doctor’s voice is evident. “Sorry, that's impossible. Magic’s not real.”

Ron’s head snaps up. He furrows his brows. Definitely a Muggle, he decides. “Not to you, I reckon.” 

“Right, well,” the Doctor says, looking miffed, “and what's that, your magic wand?”

Ron looks down at his wand, gripped and ready to fire in his right hand. “Uh...yeah. It's a bit old,” he confesses, “but we’re not particularly...well, anyway, it’s my wand, only one I've got.”

The Doctor, if anything, looks even more confused than before. “But it can't really  _ do  _ magic,” he says slowly. And then: “Can it?” There's a cautious excitement in his voice.

Ron makes a face. “Yeah, well, but I'm not allowed to do magic outside of school. And besides I couldn't do it in the presence of a Muggle…”

“Enough of this Muggle business,” the Doctor says, apparently indignant. “I'm not even human! And like I said, I landed here entirely on accident.”

“Sorry —” Ron blinks. “Go back. Not human?”

The Doctor grins, sort of maniacally. “Not precisely. I'm a Time Lord.”

“But you look human.” In his dumbstruck state, this is all Ron can muster. It seems to ruffle the Doctor.

“Oi, now! You look Time Lord. We came first.”

“But what's a Time Lord anyhow? And how’d you end up in my backyard?”

“Right, well, good question — sorry, what was your name again?”

“Ron,” says Ron. He's not really sure where to go from here. “Honestly, if you wouldn't mind just budging off — my mum really doesn't like trespassers. And Muggles aren't supposed to be able to get in here anyway, not sure quite how you managed…”

“I get into loads of places I'm not meant to,” the Doctor says dismissively. “Bit of a bad habit by now. Although! You said your dad’s got screwdrivers and tools and things?”

Ron, mildly uncertain, says, “Uh, well, yeah, in the shed — but —”

“My ship,” the Doctor says. “It's malfunctioned. I need a hammer. Big, strong, hammering...hammer. Gavel. Just needs a good smack and it'll be off again, but I lost my only proper hammer to the Loreins — nasty little buggers, them — and I'm afraid I can't get out of your backyard until my ship is fixed.”

Ron deliberates. “My mum’s gone to town,” he says. “To the shop. She'll be home in fifteen minutes, I reckon. You've got until then. You better be gone by the time she's back, though,” he adds, leveling his wand in warning.

The Doctor, instead of looking worried, just smiles broadly. “Brilliant! Fifteen minutes. All I need. You are brilliant, Ron. Lead the way to the shed.”

* * *

“So this ship,” Ron asks, as the Doctor rummages through Mr. Weasley’s toolbox. “Where is it?”

The Doctor doesn't look up. “In your backyard, where it landed. Where else?”

“Yeah, but —” Ron pauses. “Your ship is that blue box?”

“It's...well, it's a bit bigger on the inside,” the Doctor answers. 

“How does it fly, though?”

The Doctor halts in his rummaging. “Well it just — sort of — does.”

“No wings or engines or anything?” Ron frowns. “My dad did enchant his car once to fly, but it didn't go so well.”

“Sorry for your dad's car.” The Doctor finally lifts his head up, holding in his fist a massive sort of mallet. “Aha! Brilliant. To the TARDIS, then. Allons-y!”

“To the what?”

* * *

“Ain't she a beauty,” the Doctor says, smiling a charming smile at the blue box.

Ron is still quite confused by the whole ordeal. “Sorry — Doctor — I really don't understand what you plan on doing here. You're just gonna smack the box?”

“Smack the box,” the Doctor echoes. “Yup, sounds right.” He pulls out that blue glowing screwdriver and presses a button, then scans the head of the hammer with the tip of the screwdriver. “There we are. Bit more horsepower. She's quite a big ship, after all. An ordinary hammer won't do the trick.”

“What, have you made it into a sonic hammer, then?” Ron says sarcastically.

The Doctor taps his skull twice. “That's it! You're quite sharp.”

Ron blinks.  _ Sharp _ is not a word he's used to being described as. “Uh,” he says. “Bloody hell.”

“Right, stay back,” the Doctor warns, and Ron obeys, stumbling a couple metres away from the TARDIS. It's an unassuming thing, he thinks, surprisingly easy to blend in. Honestly, Ron might not even have noticed the thing if it hadn't materialized in front of him. Yes, very unassuming — 

But then the Doctor swings the hammer against the side of the TARDIS, and there's an almighty  _ clang _ that seems to resound forever. Ron’s hands come instinctively up to cover his ears. “Bloody hell!”

“Ah, there it is!” The Doctor shouts over the metallic sound ringing. He's got a hand pressed over his ear, but the other hand, having dropped the hammer, pats the side of the TARDIS as if the ship is a pet and not a box. “Beautiful sound. Oh, I love it.”

“Christ,” Ron mutters, rubbing his ears. “The hell did you do?”

“Knocked the sense back into her, so to speak,” the Doctor says, grinning widely. “You've been quite brilliant, Ron, I must say. And now I'm off. Unless —” he stops, scans Ron. “You want to come with?”

“In that blasted thing? Not in the slightest,” Ron says.

The Doctor, affronted, says defensively, “Hey, that’s my spaceship! Anywhere in the universe. Any  _ time!  _ Wherever you like!”

Ron feels like he's being swallowed. “Blimey, you were serious about the time traveling bit.”

“I am always serious about time travel,” the Doctor says solemnly. Then the childish aspect reappears.  He cocks his head. “One trip? Anywhere, anytime?”

Ron frowns. “But time travel is impossible.”

“So’s magic, and here we are,” the Doctor responds. “Go on, then. As a thank-you for the hammer. Might not wanna use this for a few days, by the way, let the sonic wear off. I can have you back five minutes from now.”

It's tempting, Ron can admit that. But he's got loads of stuff to do. “I...don't think so. Sorry, Doctor. But I hope your...ship...works.”

The Doctor sighs. “Right. Par for the course. Thank you, Ron. You've been a big help.” He holds out a hand, and Ron shakes it. “I'm off, then. Best wishes!”

With that, the Doctor steps into the TARDIS. Ron stands, dumbstruck still, and watches the thing start to wheeze and make a sort of  _ vwoomp _ sound, flickering in and out of existence, rustling up winds that send Ron’s hair aflutter, before entirely disappearing. After a moment’s hesitation, Ron steps forth into the place the TARDIS had just been. It's empty. 

As if the Doctor had never been.

Halfway convinced it’d all been a mad hallucination, Ron picks up the sonic hammer and starts back towards the Burrow. 

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> gosh, wow. I really feel like these two could be buddies. anyway, thank you for reading! sorry i'm not really feeling the capitalization thing. follow me out on tumblr @vivilevone if you wanna talk or whatever! i'm always open to conversation. and...that's it! thanks! cheers!


End file.
